


What's Easy

by naasad



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Asexual Joly, Coming Out, Discussion of Abortion, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Feels, Fluff, Happy Ending, Implied Sexual Content, Kids, M/M, Multi, Trans Joly, past pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-23
Updated: 2018-11-23
Packaged: 2019-08-27 22:36:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,845
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16711324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/naasad/pseuds/naasad
Summary: Sometimes, difficult conversations need to be had.





	What's Easy

**Author's Note:**

> So this one takes place in America because universal healthcare still blows my mind.
> 
> Also, I'd like to remind everyone that I'm ace and trans non-binary. Any aphobic or transphobic comments will be deleted. Please, still comment and let me know what you think! Just don't be dicks.

Musichetta sighed contentedly as Bossuet flopped down next to her, breathing heavily. She smiled and rolled over, wrapping a copper arm around his waist. “I needed that.”

Boss laughed and kissed the top of her head. “Yeah, me too.” He ran one dark hand up and down her side.

“Mmmm…. We should probably let Joly know we’re done.”

“Yeah.” Boss lurched out of bed and yanked on his boxers.

Joly was sitting on the couch in the living room, sorting through the mail as he bobbed his head to whatever music was playing through his noise-cancelling headphones.

Bossuet smiled and wrapped his arms around Joly’s shoulders. “Hey,” he murmured, kissing his cheek as he took off the headphones. “Do you want to come enjoy our afterglow and let us cuddle with you?”

“Did you change the sheets?” Joly asked, anxiety visibly flaring.

“No, but Chetta’s got the Jolly Joly Blanket out.”

The Jolly Joly Blanket was a snuggie. There were several around the apartment, mostly for when Joly needed his wheelchair, but Chetta had sewn an Assassin’s Creed hood onto this one and it was for one purpose and one purpose only.

Bossuet led Joly back to the bedroom and swaddled him up as best he could, tugging the hood over his head with a kiss to his nose. He tackled him to the bed and they both giggled as the bounced. Joly rolled and wiggled over to Musichetta, greeting her with kisses.

“Hey.” Boss sat back up, reaching for the envelopes now on the nightstand. “Are those my test results?”

“Hm?” Joly glanced up. “Oh, yeah.”

Bossuet grinned and ripped into the envelope. “Well, who wants to hear the good news?” His face lit up with joy and then crumbled, and his breath caught in his chest. He put a hand over his mouth, swallowing back tears and painstakingly schooling every part of his expression before speaking. “I’m sorry,” he finally said, more quiet and subdued than his partners had ever seen him. He sniffed and shook his head. “It's bad luck.”

Chetta frowned and took the paper. “HIV-negative, no other STDs…. You’re perfectly clean, that’s great!”

“Chetta.” Joly pointed to the single word at the bottom of the page, then reached over to comfort his boyfriend.

**INFERTILE**

“Oh.” There was no mistaking Chetta’s disappointment for anything else.

“You know,” Boss said, “they know me down at the hospital, and when they suggested it - ‘just in case’, knowing my luck - I was like why not? I didn’t actually think….”

“It’s okay.” Musichetta wrapped her arms around her boys. “Having a baby is a preference, not a condition or anything else. And even if it was, there are plenty other ways. Maybe we can revisit-”

Joly paled. “No,” he said, with much more force than necessary.

“Okay,” Chetta said, running a soothing hand down his arm. “There’s still things like adoption and surrogates to consider. We’ll be okay.” She sighed and kissed their foreheads. “We’ll be okay.”

* * *

The next day, Joly found himself walking to Combeferre’s, leaning heavily on his cane.

Luckily, his classmate and longtime friend was at home, otherwise, waiting on the front steps would’ve quickly become excruciating.

“What’s wrong?” Ferre asked, fetching a glass of water and a heat pad.

Joly shrugged and put his leg up on the coffee table. “A lot’s on my mind.” He paused and bit his lip. “What do you think - If we had stayed together back in high school - Do you think we’d have kids by now?”

Combeferre turned off the tap and bowed his head. “That’s a loaded question.” He walked back into the living room, handing over the water and arranging the heat pad just right before folding himself up on the other end of the couch. “What brought this on?”

“Chetta wants kids, Boss can’t, so she asked me.”

Combeferre frowned. “You haven’t come out to them yet?”

“I keep meaning to!” Joly sighed. “They know I’m ace and they assume I’m body shy, and they respect that. And every time I think about it, I end up working myself into a state and having a panic attack, so it’s just become easier… to just not.”

“Joly….”

“I know.”

A long moment passed in silence. Joly swirled the water around in his glass.

“I still think about her sometimes. Often.”

Combeferre’s face creased in pain and he looked away, staring off in space in the direction of his bookshelf. It was probably where he kept the pictures - the proof she once existed. “Me, too,” he murmured.

Joly drank his water. Sometimes it was easier to pretend she hadn’t.

* * *

When he returned home, he sat on the couch, rehearsing what he was going to say. Combeferre was usually right, and it felt like it was time.

Boss and Chetta came through the door, giggling, only a couple hours later.

“Uh-oh,” Boss sang, snuggling up to his boyfriend. “Someone’s got their serious face on.”

“We need to talk,” Joly said quietly.

Musichetta sat down on his other side. “You’re not breaking up with us, are you?” she joked.

“No,” Joly said, “but… you might want me to.”

At that, they both blinked in shock and shook their heads, almost in tandem.

“Oh, no, honey,” Musichetta said, rubbing his arm. “Whatever you have to tell us, it’s okay.”

“We love you,” Boss reminded him gently, pressing a kiss to his temple.

Joly shrugged them off and rubbed his hands on his thighs, well aware he was shaking and sweaty. “The reason I can’t give you children isn’t just because I’m sex-repulsed. I’m -” he bit his lip and went for it “-I’m trans. I have a vagina.”

“Huh.”

Joly and Chetta both whipped around to stare at their boyfriend.

Bossuet shrugged. “What? You’re still Joly, my boyfriend. Do I wish you’d told me sooner? Yes, of course. But I get it. Coming out as bi and poly was scary enough. I honestly was expecting something much more earth shattering. Did I ever tell you about Annette?”

It was perhaps Bossuet’s favorite example of his terrible luck. His last girlfriend had turned out to be a distant cousin. Neither of them had known until they ended up at the same family reunion, after which things were swiftly ended.

“Yes,” Chetta said, smiling, “we’ve heard about Annette many times.” She nudged Joly with her elbow. “And, hey, everything he said. You’re still our Joly. We love you.”

Boss nodded. “Ditto.”

Joly gave a laugh-sob of relief, falling back into their arms.

“Does anyone else know?” Chetta asked, holding him close. “I don’t want to out you.”

“Just Combeferre. We’ve been friends since we were kids, and we used to date in high school. I’d be more worried if he didn’t know.”

Bossuet laughed, and then choked on his own spit. “Wait, you used to date Ferre? Why on _earth_ would you give that up?”

Joly winced and curled up, thinking.

“L’aigle!” Chetta yelped, making faces over Joly’s head.

“It’s okay,” Joly said. “It’s okay, it’s just….” He ran a hand through his hair. “So, I’ve always been ace, right? I never got ‘crushes’ or ‘hotness’ or anything like that, but I used to love sex. I got called the school slut a lot, which wasn’t cool, but it was just fun! And my parents were really big on sex ed, so I even knew how to be safe.  
"But then, like I think it’s just the power of associations or something, my brain was like ‘if you’d never had sex, this wouldn’t have happened’, and it used to be just the word ‘sex’ would give me a panic attack, but I’ve made a lot of progress, and now it’s just that hearing it, seeing it, or being asked to participate makes me really uncomfortable, and I’m good with that.”

“Joly,” Chetta said, “you’re worrying me. What did Combeferre do?”

Joly shook his head. “Nothing! Well…. Okay, so I used to really like sex, and then I got pregnant. And it was Ferre’s, and we were so excited. We were going to be those high school sweethearts that stayed together forever! Picket fence, two-point-five kids, and a dog type of deal. We had names picked out - Ariel," he said, smiling sad and soft, almost reverent, "and then my parents agreed to pay for the birth if we got everything in the nursery ourselves, and we were even saving up for a house of our own.”  
He took a deep breath. “Then we went to the twenty week appointment to find out the gender and I saw this whole human being inside me…. And I realized that we - we were only seventeen. There was no way that we were ready.”

Bossuet and Musichetta wrapped their arms around him.

“No matter how much we thought we were, no matter how much we wanted to be, we just weren’t. So we talked. We talked about dropping out of school, about having someone we know adopt her, about having _anyone_ adopt her. In the end, none of that would've worked for us, and I had an abortion, right before the end of the second trimester.” He swallowed, blinking.  
“And you, know, it’s not like he blamed me, but you always grieve. There’s the hormone crash, or on top of that, there’s the fact that you really wanted your baby and it just wasn’t possible. And our teenage relationship couldn’t stand up to that kind of thing. You know, teenagers are supposed to be partying and having fun and making stupid choices that will all be okay in the morning and you’ll laugh about it, not - not mourning their children.   
"We just… drifted apart. We tried not to, but the more we tried, the more unhealthy we got. So we let it happen. And we’re great friends again now, but to be honest, he really was just about the last person I expected to see when I joined Les Amis.”

Bossuet nodded, making a sympathetic noise. “Wait.”

Joly laughed. “Yes, my deadname is Rainbow. My parents really should’ve seen all  _ this _ -” he gestured to his whole self “-coming.”

Musichetta laughed and kissed him. “Do you want to keep talking about this?” she asked as Bossuet snuck a kiss on his shoulder. “Or do you want to go ahead and start our movie night?”

“God, yes, let’s start movie night,” Joly sighed, grateful for the out. “Road to El Dorado?”

Bossuet snorted and stood, giving him a hand up. “Always.”

“Come on,” Musichetta called, already on the way to the bedroom. “Pajamas!”

As they changed, Joly looked down at his shirt, stretching it away from his body. He pulled it over his head and let it drop on the ground.

Bossuet glanced at his scars and drew him in for a kiss. “I love you.”

“Me, too.” Musichetta pressed her lips to his cheek as she passed by.

Joly smiled and followed the two of them back to the living room, sandwiching himself between them on the couch. “Me, three,” he murmured. He beamed with happiness.

**Author's Note:**

> (Catharsis is a hell of a drug, Joly should watch out for that. Assdfgggds ignore me I think I'm funny.)
> 
> Also, Annette is based on the line from the Brick - "if he had a mistress, he speedily discovered he had a friend also". I'm pretty sure that meant his mistress was married or something and he met the dude, not that he got friends-with-benefits-zoned (or something like that, if that's even a thing) but this is my take on an appalling example of bad luck re:mistresses in the modern day.
> 
> Anyway, I do have a tumblr and you can come scream at me @grumpymurdernerd or you can leave a comment below and I will love you forever. Me being ADHD, I am obligated to disclaim that forever may be actually forever... or it may be thirty seconds... or it may be anywhere between the two, but still. Please comment?


End file.
